All right, now turn with me,
if you would, to 1 Corinthians chapter 9. I'm sorry, 1 Corinthians chapter
2. 1 Corinthians 2. Does this life ever get you down? I thought I would write out some questions that really don't need
to be asked, but I'll ask them anyway. This sinful world that we live
in, the weight of this sinful world, the weight of sin itself,
The weight of everything it ruins. Does any of that ever get you
down? Do you ever long for something
better? You ever have moments where you
just can't wait for something better? In our scripture reading just
a second ago, we read the end of Hebrews 11, where it mentioned all of those
different believers. I love those believers. I really
do. I was thinking about them as
I was reading them earlier today and reading them right now. I
love Rahab. I've never met her, but I'm looking
forward to it. And all of those dear believers
that endured so much, oh, they went through so much. Suffering
after suffering after suffering. Some were tortured. Some had trials of cruel mockings
and scourgings. Some endured the bonds of prison. They put them in prison because
they believed on Christ. They were stoned. They were sawn asunder. You think about that. They were slain with the sword. They wandered about destitute,
afflicted, and tormented. But this is what it said there
at the end of Hebrews 11. It said, all of them who died
in faith, these all died in faith, all of them who died in faith,
they didn't on this earth receive the promises. And the reason is because it
says, God had provided something better for them. They did not receive this world,
the pleasures of this world, the favor of this world. God
did not give them the blessings that this world can offer. It
does offer it to some people. They have a good life. But it
says God did not give them the blessings that this world can
offer and the reason is because He provided something better
for them. Something not temporary. You know how short this life
is? Sometimes it feels so long. But the reality is it's so short
and as good as somebody may have it here, it's so short. It's
so short. You know, they work to attain
and work to attain and work to attain and work to attain and
they get it and they die. It's so short. God has provided
something eternal. eternal. Now, if the sorrow of
sin and the sorrow of life has got you down, if it ever gets
you down, but if you are one of the ones who are by faith
in faith, looking to Christ, I mean, looking to Christ, then
this verse of scripture is for you. 1 Corinthians 2 verse 9,
it says, but as it is written, I hath not seen nor ear heard,
neither have entered into the heart of man the things which
God hath prepared for them that love him. You know what that means? That
means something better. That's what it means, something
better. He said, it is written. And if it's written, it will
be done. If it's written, you can mark
his word. Mark his word. I hath not seen
nor ear heard Neither have entered into the heart of man, the things
which God has prepared for them that love him. Now let's begin
this message by seeing this verse in light of what he says in this
chapter. All right. First Corinthians
two verse one, the apostle Paul said, and I brethren, when I
came to you, I came not with excellency of speech, or of wisdom,
man's excellency, of man's speech or man's wisdom, declaring unto
you the testimony of God. For I determined not to know
anything among you, save Jesus Christ and Him crucified." Now
I love that verse, verse two. I love that verse so much, I
decided to put that on the front page of our bulletin. That's
at the bottom of our bulletin. What do we preach here? What
do we believe here? What is our message? What is
our platform? One thing Paul said in verse
two, I determined not to know anything among you save except
for Jesus Christ and him crucified. That's our hope. That's our salvation. That's our doctrine. That's our
delight. That's our joy. That's the joy
that we have in this life. That's our crown. That's our
acceptance. That's our redemption. That's
our knowledge. That's all the knowledge we have. He said, I've determined not
to know anything. I've decided not to know anything.
But this one thing, Jesus Christ and Him crucified. That's it.
All of that other doctrine and all that other stuff and everything
man wants to debate and everything man... I've decided I'm not doing
that anymore. Jesus Christ and Him crucified. That's it. Who He is. why he was crucified, what he
accomplished in that crucifixion, what that means for me. Paul
said, that's all I want to know. That's all I want to know. And
we say the same thing. That is all I want to know. That's it. That's all we want
to hear, isn't it? All we want to know. That's all
we want to hear. Just tell me about the God who
came to take my sin from me. Does sin ever get you down? The sin of this life, does it
ever get you down? Just tell me about the God who came to
take my sin away from me. my sins and my sin. Tell me about
the God of heaven who came to relieve me. Don't you love relief? Have you ever breathed a sigh
of relief? Tell me about the God who brought
relief to me, absolute relief to me. He relieved me of all
of my sin by putting all of it away in His death on the cross. And by His death on the cross,
He secured for me something better. Something so much better. Just
tell me about that. Just tell me about that. Verse
one says, I, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency
of speech or of wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony of God,
for I determined not to know anything among you save Jesus
Christ and Him crucified. And I was with you in weakness
and in fear and in much trembling. And my speech and my preaching
was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration
of the spirit and power. And that your faith should not
stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God, how be it
we speak wisdom among them that are perfect. That means mature.
It means taught. Yet not the wisdom of this world,
nor of the princes of this world that come to naught, but we speak
the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom which
God ordained before the world unto our glory, which none of
the princes of this world knew, for had they known it, they would
not have crucified the Lord of glory. But as it is written,
I hath not seen nor ear heard Neither have entered into the
heart of man the things which God hath prepared for them that
love Him. But God hath revealed them to
us by His Spirit. I would love to tell the things
that He has prepared, all of the things that He has waiting
for them that love Him. But here's the problem. No eye
has never seen it. No ear has ever heard it, no
heart has ever imagined it. But he said in verse 10, God
has revealed them to us by His Spirit. For the Spirit searcheth
all things, yea, the deep things of God. For what man knoweth
the things of a man save the Spirit of man which is in him? Even so, the things of God knoweth
no man but the Spirit of God. Now we have received not the Spirit of the
world, but the Spirit which is of God, that we might know the
things that are freely given to us of God." Freely given. "...which things also we speak
not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the
Holy Ghost teacheth, comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit
of God, for they are foolish unto him, neither can he know
them, because they are spiritually discerned. But he that is spiritual
judgeth all things, or discerneth all things, yet he himself is
judged or discerned of no man. For who hath known the mind of
the Lord, that he may instruct him?" But we have the mind of
Christ. We have the mind of Christ. The Spirit of God has recorded
and revealed the mind of Christ to us. The things. The things
of Christ concerning Himself and concerning us. And they are
glorious things. Very glorious things. Psalm 87
verse 3 says, glorious things are spoken of thee, O city of
God. Glorious things. What kind of
things? Well, eye hath not seen, truly. Ear hath not heard, neither hath
entered into the heart of man the things which God hath prepared
for them that love him. But he has prepared things for
them that love Him. He said at the beginning of that
verse, as it is written, he is quoting Isaiah 64. Turn with me if you would over
there to Isaiah 64. The heading at the top of my
page says, The church prayeth for the presence of God. The
church is praying for the presence of God. And verse 1 says, O that thou
wouldest rend the heavens, that thou wouldest come down, that
the mountains might flow down at thy presence. Oh that you
would rend the heavens, that you would do that. He will. He will. That is exactly what
He's going to do. And He goes on down and He says
in verse 6, we are all as an unclean thing. And all our righteousnesses
are as filthy rags, and we all do fade as a leaf, and our iniquities
like the wind have taken us away. What that means is we ruined
everything in our sin. We've ruined everything by our
sin. And we deserve nothing. If you
look at verse seven, it says, there is none that calleth upon
thy name. that stirreth up himself to take
hold of thee, none. We've ruined everything, we deserve
nothing, and if anything's gonna be restored to us, God is gonna
have to do it. Verse eight says, but now, O
Lord, thou art our Father, we are the clay, and thou our potter,
and we all are the work of thy hand. He's the one, if we're
gonna be restored, He's gonna be the one that has to do it.
And He will do it. And He has done it for His people
through the one who came. Jesus Christ and Him crucified. Now here's the good news of our
message. God has prepared things for His people. And everything
that he has prepared for us, he has freely given to us. It's all free. And what I want
to do is I want to take the rest of our time to go through the
scriptures that tell us some of the things that he has prepared.
Some of the things that God's spirit has revealed to us in
his word. Just a few of the things, not
all of them, but just a few of the things that He has prepared
for them that love Him. All right, go with me first to
Psalm 9. Psalm 9 verse 7. It says, But the Lord shall endure
forever. He hath prepared His throne for
judgment. He has prepared His throne for
judgment. God is going to judge all sin
for His people. He's gonna judge all sin for
Himself and for His people. I cannot wait for that to happen. I cannot wait for that to happen.
He has already judged the power of sin over His people. He has
already judged the penalty of sin over His people on the cross
of Calvary. But soon that judgment is going
to rid us of all presence of sin. I know it's hard to enter into
this because the eye has never seen this. We've never seen a
world that has no sin in it. We try to imagine what that will
be like, but you can't. You really can't. But soon, I
mean soon, it could be really soon. I can honestly say any minute
now, he's going to rid all sin. He's going to get rid of, this
is what he has prepared a throne of judgment and all sin is about to be gone.
I mean, it's about to be gone. All sin in us, we still have
that presence. The power's gone, the penalty's
gone, but we still have that presence. All sin in us, all
sin around us. It's all about to be gone. And we'll never be able to imagine
what that's gonna be like until we experience it. Never be able
to imagine. All sin is about to be gone.
Look at Psalm 10 verse 17. It says, Lord, thou hast heard
the desire of the humble. Thou wilt prepare their heart. Thou wilt cause thine ear to
hear. Thou wilt prepare their heart. This is what David said in Psalm
51. And you know David in that psalm, boy he was pleading, he
was crying, he was begging, he was hurting, he was suffering.
This is what he was begging God to do. He said, create in me
a clean heart. Renew a right spirit within me. Aren't you looking forward to
knowing what that would feel like? A clean heart. A right spirit, that new heart
that God creates, it does reside in all of His quickened children. It does, but it's overshadowed
by that filthy, rotten, stinking, wicked heart that still remains
in the flesh. The moment that that throne of
judgment strips all of that away, All that's going to be left is
that clean heart, that right spirit that worships God perfectly. Wouldn't you love to? We never
have, and on this earth we never will, but wouldn't you love to
truly worship God perfectly? I mean perfectly, just in complete
adoration of Him. That's something to look forward
to. That really is. For a believer, that is something
to look forward to. To sit there listening to Him
preach. He's going to be the pastor.
He's going to be the preacher. And He's going to stand there
and preach the Word. Not one word will ever fail. And to sit there and listen to the
Gospel preached, I mean just Your heart burning within you.
You know, you get that little moment of heartburn. It's just
a fleeting thing, but it's just, it's never going to end. It's
going to be an eternal. That's something to look forward to.
Now I'm going to tell you this. Eye has never seen that. Ear
has never heard that. And it's never, we're trying,
it's trying to enter the heart, but it's never truly entered
the heart, what that's going to be like. But it's something
to look forward to. That's something God has prepared
for us. Look at Psalm 61. Psalm 61, verse 7, it says, He shall abide before God forever. Oh prepare mercy and truth which
may preserve him forever. Mercy and truth to preserve. This is what God has prepared.
Mercy and truth. Look at Psalm 68 verse 10. It says, thy congregation hath
dwelt therein. Thou, O God, hast prepared of
thy goodness for the poor. Thy goodness, that means grace.
Thy grace, mercy, truth, grace. God has prepared mercy, truth,
and grace for all of his people. What's waiting for us when we
get there? What is going to be sitting there waiting for us
when we get there? Grace is. Mercy is. Truth is. Eternal mercy is going to forever
cry. Eternal mercy will forever cry,
thou art worthy. for thou was slain and has redeemed
us to God by thy blood. Thou art worthy because you did
not give us what we deserve. Instead of that, you've given
us an eternity of what we don't deserve. You talk about receiving
what we don't deserve. We say, grace, grace, that's
getting what you don't deserve. When eye has not seen, ear has
never heard, and it's never entered into the heart of man, the grace
of God that is coming to him once he enters that presence. You talk about look around saying,
Why me? You're going to spend eternity,
and I pray I'm going to spend eternity with you, crying, Why
me? Why me? Why me? All of His goodness, every stitch
of goodness He has, every stitch of grace that He has, He's going
to pour it on His people, all eternity. See if you can find
the book of Zephaniah. If your Bible's like mine, it's
page 1164. It's four books from the end of the Old Testament.
Malachi, Zechariah, Haggai, and Zephaniah. Zephaniah 1. Verse 7, it says, Hold thy peace at the presence
of the Lord God, for the day of the Lord is at hand. For the
Lord hath prepared a sacrifice. He hath bid his guests. He has prepared an eternal sacrifice. One sacrifice for sin forever. Our Lord Jesus Christ said, a
body hast thou prepared me. He said, for this cause came
I into the world. Simeon, he held this earthly
speaking, eight day old child, and he blessed God and said,
Lord, now let us thou thy servant depart in peace according to
thy word. For mine eyes have seen thy salvation,
which thou hast prepared before the face of all people, the eternal
sacrifice. That's what's going to be waiting
for us. You know, we have the sacrifice now. We worship the
sacrifice now. We're going to look at the sacrifice. We think, well, that happened
2,000 years ago. That's seated on the throne.
John said, I beheld and lo in the midst of the throne and of
the four beasts and in the midst of the elders stood a lamb as
it had been slain. An eternal sacrifice. That's
going to be a glorious sight to behold. I hadn't seen it, you hadn't
heard it, but it's going to be a glorious sight. Just like the
Queen of Sheba, when she saw Solomon, you know, she came and
adored him and had reverence for him and brought her treasures
to him. But when she saw him in his glory,
there was no more spirit in her. And that's what's going to happen
to us. It's just going to be the most glorious slaying you've
ever felt. That just slayed me. Behold the
Lamb. Just wait until you actually
behold the Lamb. Turn with me to Matthew 25. Matthew 25 verse 31, it says, When the Son of Man shall come
in His glory, and all the holy angels with Him, then shall He
sit upon the throne of His glory. And before Him shall be gathered
all nations, and He shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd
divideth his sheep from the goats. And He shall set the sheep on
His right hand, but the goats on his left. Then shall the king
say unto them on his right hand, come ye blessed of my father,
inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of
the world. God has prepared a kingdom for
his people. Hebrews 11 calls it a city. It also calls it a country. Some people are city people and
some people are country people. It doesn't matter. Everybody's
going to be happy. There won't be city people and country people.
Everybody's going to be the same. We're all going to be Christ
people, but it's going to be home to all of His people. Home. All are going to be just
like Him. They're going to desire the same
thing He desires. There's going to be no divisions.
That's something to look forward to. Can't imagine what that's
going to be like. There's going to be no divisions. They will all be one. One glorious
kingdom under one glorious King. Our Lord said to his disciples
in John 14, I am going to prepare a place for you. He said, if
you've put your faith in me, if I've put that faith in you
and I've caused you to look to me and to cast your all on me. then you can rest assured, I'm
going to prepare a place for you. And he said, if I go, I
will come again to receive you to myself. And when he does,
this is what it will mean for us, all right? Go with me to
Revelation 21. He will, as we read in Isaiah
64, he will rend the heavens. He will come down. He will gather
His people to Himself, and then this is what's going to happen.
This is what it will mean for them. Revelation 21, verse 1,
it says, And I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first
heaven and the first earth were passed away, and there was no
more sea. And I, John, saw the holy city,
New Jerusalem, coming down from God, out of heaven, prepared
as a bride adorned for her husband. Eye hath not seen, ear hath not
heard, neither hath entered into the heart of man the things that
God hath prepared for them that love Him. I mean love Him. This is what He has prepared.
A loving union. A loving union. A union of true
love between Christ and His wife. Verse 3 says, I heard a great
voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with
men, and He will dwell with them. And they shall be His people,
and God Himself shall be with them and be their God, and God
shall wipe away all tears from their eyes." Is anybody crying down here?
If so, you better enjoy it while you can. Because God is going
to wipe away all tears from our eyes. There's going to be no more death of any kind. Neither sorrow. You better get
sad all you can down here because it's going away quickly, very
quickly. Nor crying. Neither shall there
be any more pain. No pain. For the former things
are passed away. And he that sat upon the throne
said, behold, I make all things new. And he said unto me, write,
for these words are true and faithful. I can't wait. I mean that, I cannot wait. I'm
happy to be here as long as the Lord would have me to be here.
But I can't see that. I can't physically see what's
going on right now. I can't hear it. Oh, there's some beautiful music
being sung right now. There's some happy conversation
taking place right now. I can't see it. I can't hear
it. I can't imagine it, but I can't wait. I can't wait because of
what God's spirit has revealed by faith. I can't wait. I know you can't either. Here's
the summary of the message. Hang in there. It's almost here. If we just walk out, getting
ahold of that, hang in there. It's almost here. All right,
let's all stand together.